That's the (Florida) spirit

Thursday

Apr 26, 2012 at 11:31 AM

The Waterses are part of a burgeoning trend in the alcohol-producing industry. They are micro-distillers — sometimes referred to as craft distillers — a gradually swelling cousin to the small, niche beer and wine producers that boast of deep regional roots.

By Bill ThompsonStaff writer

UMATILLA — It seems out of place.

A lonesome palm tree shooting up in the forefront of a southeast Marion County farm whose pasture is dotted with impressive live oaks.

But further up the ranch's dirt driveway, in a converted horse barn nestled among a clump of those oaks, that singular palm takes on a new significance.

It serves to distinguish the name and logo of Palm Ridge Reserve — a handmade, homemade whiskey that Dick and Marti Waters distill in their barn.

The Waterses are part of a burgeoning trend in the alcohol-producing industry. They are micro-distillers — sometimes referred to as craft distillers — a gradually swelling cousin to the small, niche beer and wine producers that boast of deep regional roots.

As with any challenge to the accepted business norm, making headway, not to mention profits, depends on deflating a stereotype. In the Waterses' case, that means convincing liquor drinkers that smooth, flavorful whiskeys can be made in places like Marion County and not just Kentucky, Tennessee, Canada or Ireland.

It all begins with a sip.

On a sunny but chilly morning recently, Dick Waters siphons off into a small measuring cup a couple ounces of the clear liquid — which bears a remarkable resemblence to moonshine but is known to distillers as “white dog” — flowing from a tube protruding from his 8-foot-tall copper still.

He sips the brew, waits a moment, sips again, waits and then finishes the cup.

Close but quite, he surmises.

In addition to being co-founder, president and co-marketing director of his company, Florida Farm Distillers, Waters is most responsible for engineering Palm Ridge Reserve's “flavor profile.”

Before becoming a whiskey maker, Waters was a long-time whiskey drinker. He preferred to wash his palate with the iconic Canadian-produced blend Crown Royal.

He is also a former plumber and construction worker. Marti mostly worked for him during that career.

The Waterses also kept horses and cattle on their 80-acre farm near Umatilla, which they bought in the 1980s. They moved there from Casselberry 20 years ago.

Their last horse was put down last year, Marti Waters said, although a dozen cattle still roam the site.

Their entry into the spirits industry came as the construction industry was headed south.

Marti Waters said she read a newspaper article in 2007 that related how farmers in the Midwest turned to distilling to supplement their falling incomes.

“I called him and said, ‘Honey, you like to drink whiskey. Have I got a job for you,' ” she recalled.

Dick Waters embraced the idea, but admits now he wasn't prepared for the regulatory obstacles and the fickle ways of Florida's alcohol industry.

The couple spent two years, and upward of $100,000, securing the necessary federal, state and local permits and obtaining the equipment for their operation.

Palm Ridge Reserve finally hit the market in 2010.

And the ongoing costs can be considerable.

They pay $4,000 a year for a state license.

The specially charred, 5-gallon white oak barrels, imported from Arkansas, that add so much of the whiskey's flavor run about $130 apiece.

And each gallon of Palm Ridge Reserve is slapped with a total of $20 in taxes from the federal and state governments.

That's about triple the combined levy for beer and roughly double that of wine — not to mention a big hit for a small company that manages to produce about 1,200 gallons a year.

Dick Waters will repeat the taste tests several times a day during the 10 hours the 60-gallon still — hand-built in Arkansas' Ozark Mountains by a maker named Col. Vaughn Wilson — runs on distilling days.

A glass pitcher catches the liquor flowing from the tube. The first batch in a daily yield of about five gallons typically comes off at around 140 proof.

Waters uses a key ingredient — tap water pumped straight from the well on his property — to cut the product until it reaches the optimal for barreling of between 110 proof and 118 proof.

“We put the micro in micro-distillery,” Dick Waters said of their two-person production line, which includes Marti bottling the whiskey one bottle at a time.

“Being this small, we knew we had to do something different.”

Waters is an autodidact: His knowledge of operating a still has been gleaned from consulting a friend familiar with the distilling process, from books and online research, and advice from Col. Wilson.

That homegrown expertise was coupled with five months of experimentation, during which the Waterses utilized the taste buds of family and friends to narrow down the characteristics they liked.

Today, with the recipe complete, making Palm Ridge Reserve is more art than science. Other than a digital thermometer that tracks the water temperature and a thermometer-looking gauge that reveals the alcohol content in each sample, the operation in that one-time horse stall housing the still is decidedly low-tech.

“It's a very old-fashioned way of distilling,” Dick Waters noted. “It's that homespun thing, that mom-and-pop-making-whiskey-down-on-the-farm kind of thing.

“It's not like we're geniuses here. It's only unique because it's what we wanted,” he said.

“I'm judging it by what the whiskey tastes like,” Dick Waters added.

Waters said coyly that he arrived at the formula by doing “some things with the still” and other secret steps or ingredients that he declines to reveal.

Still, he acknowledges that his mash is made from a combination of Florida corn, toasted rye flakes, barley malt and rye malt.

The recipe also calls for a few toasted chips from the bark of an orange tree on the property. And then there is the help supplied by the aquifer and the flavoring contributed by the barrel during aging, typically done for about eight months.

The barrel is critical for another reason: According to Dick Waters, Palm Ridge Reserve is the only barrel-aged whiskey produced in Florida.

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